Without a Destination
by Dash Nolan
Summary: After destroying Copy X, Zero finds himself wandering through the desert without a destination.


Without a Destination

by D.N.

Part I

_Here they come..._

Beautifully glowing orbs of pure light soared by in groups of three and four, leaving temporarily-distorted pockets of air in their wake. Zero could feel the heat off each plasma shot as it passed. Normally he didn't like to cut it this close, but with as many Neo Arcadian droids as there were around him in now, he really didn't have much of a choice. The red warrior kicked his back foot off the crumbling wall behind him and he fell nearly twenty feet.

Zero met the ground running, having already drawn his buster pistol. He feathered the blaster's trigger with precision, causing a near stream of energy bolts to flow from the barrel. Two droids took torso hits and fell to the ground in violent spasms. The pair exploded in semi-spherical bursts of fire and debris. Of course, Zero had already downed four more Neo Arcadian soldiers by the time of the detonations.

_This is more than last time. Where do they all come from?_

Zero hadn't had time to scan where each squadron was located by the time he had to leap from the building. When he caught sight of a quartet of droids taking aim, Zero quickly darted right in search of suitable cover. What he found instead were the faces of six Neo Arcadia units armed with large electro-batons. Streams of crackling electricity arched and snaked around the glowing clubs, ionizing the surrounding air.

_Shit!_

Immediately realizing he had no time to draw a different weapon, Zero brought his pistol in, jammed it up into the stomach of the lead droid, and fired. An orb of golden light exploded out of the lower back of the soldier unit in a fountain of wiring and rouge hydraulic fluids. Zero leapt back and slid the buster pistol back into its sizable hip holster just as the droid's body erupted in flame. This gave him time to reach over his shoulder and bring out a white, bone-shaped, 10-inch long rod. In a brilliant flash, translucent green energy cascaded out of the handle and froze into an emerald arrow about a meter in length. It had all taken under two seconds.

Zero dashed forward and brought the blade of light around in a quick upward slash, cutting clean through the second Neo Arcadia droid. The body fell to the ground in two pieces, revealing an open path to a pair of soldier units. A wide horizontal slash sent two consecutive bursts of amber sparks into the air, leaving massive glowing gashes in both droids. Zero merely shouldered between the two, sending their lifeless structures falling. With a quick slash left, then right, the red warrior cut down two more Neo Arcadia soldiers.

He finally allowed himself to rest as the last of the close-range combat team fell silent. Zero attempted to survey the area around him, but the fires and smoke rising from the chaos cut visibility down to near nothing. His fingers tightened around the beam saber's pommel as his eyes swept the wreckage.

One of the droid shells near his feet twitched upwards, causing a few stray embers to leap into the smoke. Just as Zero turned toward the anomaly, a green shape emerged from the fog nearly ten feet off the ground. Operating on pure reflex, the red warrior spun right and brought his sword around in an upwards diagonal slash as the thing back down. Zero was met with the unsettling sound of plasma bursting through pounds metal and false flesh.

He took a breath before focusing his attention on what he had just rendered inactive. There, lying on the ground behind him, were the two halves of a green, slimmed-down Neo Arcadian soldier with clawed hands and extended leg partitions. The unit's skin seemed to reflect some of the light from the fires surrounding it, revealing that its epidermis was coated in a slick, glossy substance.

_I hate these things. Where there's one, there's usually too many more. Best to get the jump on them before they get the chance on me._

Steeling his nerves in one quick shrug, Zero kicked in his dash repulsors and shot through the smoke. He had assumed that the smoke had made up a simple barrier in his vision, but Zero quickly learned that it had become much thicker and was taking up a large part of the area. Realizing this, he slowed to a simple jog and tried as he attempted to get his bearings.

The red warrior was startled from his thoughts when another green creature materialized into view, leaping at Zero just as the previous one had. Unfortunately, Zero had let his guard down just long enough for the leaping Neo Arcadia unit to land atop him, pinning Zero to the ground with immense strength. The green droid lifted its left hand and its clawed fingers became sizable blades. Taking the initiative, Zero rolled to his left a half-second before the metal claws came down, sending chunks of concrete into the air.

In the time it took the creature to remove its claw from within the decimated roadway, the Resistance warrior hand risen to his knees and brought his beam sabre straight back. With as much strength as he could, Zero plunged the arrow of green plasma into the green soldier unit's face. Hydraulic fluids erupted around the growing wound as the sabre's blade continued through, finally stopping a few mere inches from the white pommel.

What had seemed like a solid shape of green glass moments before blinked out of existence a second later. Zero wearily returned the sabre's handle to its charger on his back and slowly rose to his feet. With the blade no longer wedged in, loose wires coated in a dark brown syrup fell out through the gaping head wound in the Neo Arcadian unit. The red warrior tried his best to ignore the gruesome sight, but it proved impossible.


End file.
